David Samuel Peckinpah (/ˈpɛkɪnˌpɑː/; February 21, 1925 – December 28, 1984) was an American film director and screenwriter. His 1969 Western epic The Wild Bunch received two Academy Award nominations and was ranked No. 80 on the American Film Institute's top 100 list. His films employed a visually innovative and explicit depiction of action and violence as well as a revisionist approach to the Western genre.

Peckinpah's films deal with the conflict between values and ideals, as well as the corruption and violence in human society. His characters are often loners or losers who desire to be honorable but are forced to compromise in order to survive in a world of nihilism and brutality. He was given the nickname "Bloody Sam" owing to the violence in his films.

Peckinpah's combative personality, marked by years of alcohol and drug abuse, affected his professional legacy. The production of many of his films included battles with producers and crew members, damaging his reputation and career during his lifetime. Peckinpah's other films include Ride the High Country (1962), Major Dundee (1965), The Ballad of Cable Hogue (1970), Straw Dogs (1971), The Getaway (1972), Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid (1973), Bring Me the Head of Alfredo Garcia (1974), Cross of Iron (1977) and Convoy (1978).

The Peckinpahs originated from the Frisian Islands in the northwest of Europe. Both sides of Peckinpah's family migrated to the American West by covered wagon in the mid-19th century. Peckinpah and several relatives often claimed Native American ancestry, but this has been denied by surviving family members. Peckinpah's great-grandfather, Rice Peckinpaugh, a merchant and farmer in Indiana, moved to Humboldt County, California, in the 1850s, working in the logging business, and changed the spelling of the family name to "Peckinpah".

Peckinpah Meadow and Peckinpah Creek, where the family ran a lumber mill on a mountain in the High Sierra east of North Fork, California, have been officially named on U.S. geographical maps. Peckinpah's maternal grandfather was Denver S. Church, a cattle rancher, Superior Court judge and United States Congressman of a California district including Fresno County.

Sam Peckinpah's nephew is David Peckinpah, who was a television producer and director, as well as a screenwriter. He was a cousin of former New York Yankees shortstop Roger Peckinpaugh.

David Samuel Peckinpah was born February 21, 1925, to David Edward (1895–1960) and Fern Louise (née Church) Peckinpah (1893–1983) in Fresno, California, where he attended both grammar school and high school. He had an elder brother, Denver Charles (1916–1996). He spent much time skipping classes with his brother to engage in cowboy activities on their grandfather Denver Church's ranch, including trapping, branding, and shooting. During the 1930s and 1940s, Coarsegold and Bass Lake were still populated with descendants of the miners and ranchers of the 19th century. Many of these descendants worked on Church's ranch. At that time, it was a rural area undergoing extreme change, and this exposure is believed to have affected Peckinpah's Western films later in life.

He played on the junior varsity football team while at Fresno High School, but frequent fighting and discipline problems caused his parents to enroll him in the San Rafael Military Academy for his senior year.